


Caught in a Bad Romance....a meta of Buffy's Romantic Relationships

by shadowkat67



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Based on a Lady Gaga Song, Essays, F/M, Fandom Allusions & Cliches & References, Inspired by Fanfiction, Literary References & Allusions, Meta, Other, Romance, Tragic Romance, non-fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-20
Updated: 2010-02-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:48:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22412755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowkat67/pseuds/shadowkat67
Relationships: Angel/Buffy Summers, Spike/Buffy Summers
Kudos: 1





	Caught in a Bad Romance....a meta of Buffy's Romantic Relationships

_I want your ugly, I want your disease, I want your everything, so long as it's free, I want your love, love, love, love, I want your love, I want your drama, the touch of your hand, I want your leather studded kiss in the sand, I want your love, love love love, I want your love, you know that I you, and you know that I need you, I want it bad, a bad romance, I want your love and, I want your revenge, you and me could write a bad romance, I want your love, and all your lover's revenge, you and me could write a bad romance, oh oh oh, caught in a bad romance_

\- Lady Gaga - Bad Romance

The Bad Romance - and I don't mean bad in the idea of badly written or poorly scripted, but bad as in the type of romance that is all drama, storm and drange, wild and passion, burning love, desire...where the lover's die for one another, or yearn, and forget all else. Which works quite nicely in a romance novel - something written by Rosemary Rodgers, Laurell K. Hamilton, or Stephanie Meyer or even Shakespeare - where the lover's die or ride off into the sunset, happy, without dealing with the painful reality of it.

There's actually really good bit of dialogue in the Buffy Series, but it is unfortunately overshadowed by the scene that comes immediately after it - even though that scene and those that follow emphasize every word and validate every word spoken, as have all the scenes before it including those in the first four seasons.

> BUFFY: (calmer) I have feelings for you. I do. But it's not love. I could never trust you enough for it to be love.  
>  SPIKE: (laughing) Trust is for old marrieds, Buffy. (Buffy rolling her eyes) Great love is wild ... and passionate and dangerous. It burns and consumes.  
>  BUFFY: Until there's nothing left. Love like that doesn't last.

The words the heroine, Buffy, states to her lover, Spike, are those that come from experience. She's been caught in more than one bad romance. Appears to be doomed to replay the same moves, over and over, just with different partners, and it never gets any easier. Each partner, if anything, seems better suited to her, she cares even more about them, and losing them - hurts even more. Love...love...love..it's become a choke in her throat.

The first, Ford - her first crush, reunites with her later in the episode _Lie to Me_ \- which in some respects states the same message stated above. In _Lie to Me_ , a teenage Buffy fancies herself in love with Angel, but she doesn't know who he is. She trusts him, but should she? Her trust is the trust of an adolescent, more hormone driven then anything else.

During the course of the episode, she is given multiple reasons not to trust Angel, each of which she discards. First she spies him with Drusilla, a female vampire. Then later, finds out from Angel himself who Drusilla is and what he did to her, how he made Drusilla. It's a warning, which Buffy discards. The warning is emphasized by her relationship with Ford, her first crush, a guy who in some respects isn't all that different from Angel - older than she was, popular with the girls, a jock. And he's dying of a brain tumor, so Ford decides to use what he figured out about Buffy, along with Buffy's feelings for him, to bargain for eternal life. He tricks Buffy into entering a vault with a bunch of other willing victims, deluded souls who have romanticized vampires. She only manages to escape by threatening to end Drusilla's life - Drusilla is the love of Spike, and Spike - Buffy quickly figures out is as enamored of Dru as she is of Angel. He would die for Dru, at least at this point. He lets Buffy and everyone go. Except for Ford - who he turns into a vampire, well aware that Buffy will slay him come morning. The episode ends with a conversation between Giles and Buffy, Buffy wanting Giles to tell her that the world is not this complicated, this painful. And he sighs, in compassion. And lies.

This episode is a percursor to the ones that follow - Innocence, the aptly named episode where Buffy discovers who Angel is, without the soul, without the curse. A monster. She tells herself throughout the series that Angelus is not Angel. It wasn't you. Rationalizing her love for him. Lying to herself. Because of course, as Angelus himself states, and Spike, and all who have known Angel as both Angelus and Angel - on an intimate basis - it is him. Angelus is merely Angel without a moral compass or soul. That's it. Angelus is Angel without the guilt. Turn off the guilt and you have Angelus.

Rahriah - in her fanfic - "Parliament of Monsters" actually writes a rather decent characterization of Angel, which I think comes relatively close to the series intentions:

_They all forgot--even he, sometimes--that Angel hadn't sprung full-grown from the forehead of Angelus, just add soul and stir. No, he'd built Angel with his bare hands: forged a new self out of guilt and misery and the least promising of raw materials, day by day, year by laborious year. Liam of Galway had never been a good man, in life or in death, with a soul or without one. Once upon a time he hadn't been an evil one, and that was the highest goal he could conceive for himself after his soul had been thrust back upon him._

_In Buffy's arms he had believed, for the first time in two and a half centuries, that he could aspire to more than simply not evil. No mere girl could give him that, but Buffy was no mere girl._

[Chapter 5, POM, from [http://www.allaboutspike.com/chapter.html?id=712&expid=1487](http://www.allaboutspike.com/chapter.html?id=712&expid=1487)]

But Buffy has romanticized Angel, much as have others, for many of the same reasons. He is every young girl's fantasy and I include myself in that depiction - the hulking hero, strong, brutal, dangerous, mysterious - could kill with a smile, but never you. Older. The Father but not the father - not related at all, yet he is older than you and therein lies the taboo. You know nothing about him, but you love him. And when you kiss him, you just want to die, to be swallowed up whole. He's our celebrity crushes, his visage sits on the posters in our rooms. When David Boreanze was cast in the role - he was cast purely for his good looks. They were hunting for a guy who was tall, dark, handsome, and had a wicked smile. The casting agent found him walking his dog in her neighborhood and took a picture then passed it around and all the women at work, fawned over him. His acting skills such as they were - came as a surprise. (This is in the commentary of at least three of the Series DVDS).

But theirs is a bad romance. Angel almost kills her more than once. Their first kiss - he turns into a vampire and she screams. They sleep together - and he wakes him with a taste for human blood, kills a woman on the street, and then attempts to kill everyone else. She sends him to hell - but with a kiss. He comes back, ferocious, she tames him, but only to discover that he can play the role of Angelus far too well for it to be someone else. He gets poisoned, she saves him but only by almost killing herself. It's Romeo and Juliet, except with superpowers and the ability to destroy the world. When he finally leaves, he continues to haunt her, stalking in the mists, a foggy presence just outside her range of vision. Never quite gone, but never quite there either - perhaps he never was. That's the problem with first loves or lusts, they always remain out of reach. We touch them, come too close and they become dust. By the time she falls for Riley, Buffy has come to the horrid realization that being around Angel is akin to having her skin ripped off repeatedly. He will always hurt her. And she will always hurt him. This is made apparent in the episodes I Will Always Remember You and Sancturary, as well as Pangs and Yoko Factor.

Yet, we like the fantasy. The idea that it could work. Or just to watch it play out.

Buffy/Riley was no better. The issues Buffy faced with Angel and Ford, were repeated with Riley. The perfect boyfriend. He was Angel, but without the drama or the baggage, without the fangs. Older, smart, big, muscular, handsome, the popular guy - the jock. A man's man. She could take him out on double dates with Xander. Or hang out with Willow. He was safe to bring home to Mom. She didn't have to worry about him killing anyone. Trust should not have been an issue. Yet, it still was. Their romance quickly soured, and became the Bad Romance. He was part of an organization that Buffy could not trust or respect. His values and view of the world were far more rigid than hers. He needed things from Buffy that she could not provide at that point in her life. I honestly think she would have had the same problems with Angel. Riley needed to be the hero, he needed to be in control - the dominant partner. You see it in his by-play with Sam in As You Were - Sam is in the subordinate position. She's his partner, but he takes the lead, and she joined his unit, his team. As his friend Graham states - do you want to be the mission or the mission's boyfriend? Angel ironically made the same exact decision in I Will Always Remember You - when given the choice to be Buffy's boyfriend/her lover or to be the champion/the mission? He chose the latter. And he chose not to let her remember any of it or even to really have the time to stop him from doing it. In Into the Woods - Riley more or less does the same thing. He makes his decision and gives Buffy relatively little time to stop him or come to grips with it. She can't stop him any more than she could stop Angel. Except Angel may be bit kinder in that he saves her from the guilt, as Riley is a little bit kinder in telling her what he is doing and not choosing for her. Riley does at least give her the option to stop him. Angel never does.

This brings us to Spike. A lot has been written regarding the controversial Buffy/Spike relationship in S6 and S7 of the series. In S6 it is definitely a Bad Romance. With all the trappings. Fanfic writers attempt to rewrite that season - to find ways of reconciling bits and pieces of it. I've read numerous versions, each depicting how the relationship would have worked if Spike had not gotten a soul and Buffy decided to have an actual relationship with him.

In the most recent fic I've read, Darkapple's _Imitation of A Man_ \- Spike and Buffy are whisked away to another dimension at the end of Dead Things. In this dimension they meet not one but two versions of Spike. One is William - the man - before he was turned. The other is Rebel - a version of Spike that was turned by Angelus and never loved Drusilla. They are whisked there on a bet - Buffy, to stop the Lord of Vampires from taking Spike back to hell because he appears to be defective (he hasn't drunk human blood or killed for more than a year due to the chip), bets the Lord that Spike is more than capable of doing something nasty. So they are whisked there. If Spike fails to kill the human William, Buffy is stuck in the other dimension and Spike is whisked back to hell.

The story has all the trappings of a bad romance. Buffy beats up Spike. Spike loves her no matter what. Buffy thinks Spike is killing again and fears loving or trusting him. He bends over backwards to plead his innocence. And so it goes. There are some rather funny bits - I almost busted a gut laughing at Ganral, Lord of Vampires, describing Spike's killing habits. Apparently instead of killing a human, Spike choloroforms a whole series of humans, in order to kill an East India Trader's pet moongoose. The only fight he has is with the pet moongoose. (This made me laugh.) There's also a rather funny bit - when Dawn finds out that Buffy attempted to claim/resire Spike - which is far too long to reproduce here - so go: <http://darkapple.livejournal.com/25026.html> (to read it). (Which almost needs to be read to be truly appreciated. I laughed really hard. The writer truly makes fun of the whole claiming bit in romantic fiction.)

At times, _Imitiation_ feels like a satire. The depictions of William are reminiscent of the penny-dreadful novels that we are told he is reading. And his blind devotion to Buffy speaks more of lust or mere idol worship than love. William's love for Buffy reminds me of Buffy's love for Angel -about as substantial as a cloud or passing rainbow after a storm. He wants to die when he kisses her. He wants to devote his whole self to her. She makes him "heartsick". It is to a degree all about him. He does not see Buffy, so much as he sees what he desires. His fantasy. Spike is much the same way. In Dead Things - Buffy is in the alley, getting up the courage to turn herself in for killing Katerina. She believes, as does Spike, that she killed Katrina. Their disagreement is not whether she did it, but whether she should have to pay for it. Spike could care less about Katerina. Even if Buffy deliberately killed Katerina, he'd still be in the alley, still blocking her path, he'd still hide the body. He does not understand her guilt. It's not that he is incapable of guilt. He does feel it. But he is incapable of feeling guilty regarding the death of a stranger or someone he is not directly connected to. Spike is not a strict sociopath - he can feel. He just doesn't have a moral compass. Why Buffy is upset about Katrina - makes no sense to him. He would however understand why she'd be guilt-ridden over killing someone close to her or to him. His love is selfish. His actions selfish. Most people's are, actually.

What is established early on - is Spike's view of love is possession. It is again the bad romance. He wants her ugly, he wants her disease, he wants her revenge...it's all emotion. Pure poetry. Hearts and flowers. And to an extent, we all crave that - wild passion. It can be freeing. To devour someone else. In the series, Buffy eventually does the right thing - and attempts to break things off clean with him. Realizing that she can not love him, that she is merely hurting him and herself.

The question so many of the fanfics pose regarding this relationship is if human beings like Buffy do horrible things with souls, why does Spike need one. Perhaps a better question is not that they do horrible things with or without souls, but the degree to which they do them. It often comes done to a matter of degree. Ensouled, Spike realizes their relationship could not work - that she did not love him and was using him to deal with her own pain. He gains her trust and love in the Seventh Season, and also gains an understanding of what selfless love is - the ability to let someone go or to stay and help them, without needing something in return. To love as he states in Touched, without requiring a response. Not using love as a weapon or a tool to acquire what one wants. Without a soul, he is all emotion, all fury, he wants. It is the difference between someone ruled by their own desires, what they want over all else, and someone who realizes that sometimes what we want...is harmful to someone else. Temperance.

Buffy knows, even at the end of Darkapple's tale, that their relationship can't work. She knows as does he, that she can never truly trust him. With her perhaps. But not really with anyone else. And yes, trust is a delicate thing in any event...soul or no soul...but in most cases, not all, but about 85% of them, people with a moral compass don't kill.

Vampires. Why the fascination in romantic fiction? We go from Bram Stoker's depiction of the vampire - a seductive evil that insinuates his way into his victim's life and sucks it dry, turning the victim into a ghoulish creature like himself to Stephenie Meyer's sparkling vampires who play baseball, frolic, and can walk in the sunshine. The only thing the two have in common is they don't die, well not easily at any rate and not unless something or someone deliberately kills them.

Joss Whedon, creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer - stated during a Q&A at the Secular Humanist Society, that vampires are a metaphor for the necessity of death, to give life meaning. Without death, we don't fully appreciate life. Or others lives. Mortality makes us human, it gives our lives purpose, and an outline. It is something we all share. I remember reading somewhere - I think it was from the writer of the Life of Pi, that death wishes to devour life, loves life, envies life, wants to possess life, stalks life. But life drifts from its grasp.

Spike is S6 reminds me a great deal of that metaphor. Their dance feels like a dance between life and death. Buffy wants to die, she is literally dancing with death, over and over again she throws herself into its arms, but death can't take her - because in doing so, death extinguishes the very thing he wants to possess. It's a bad romance - both characters can't have what they want. Buffy wants death. Spike wants life. She wants the fire, but doesn't want to be burned. He wants it to, and seems not to care if he gets burned. This can't end well.

Nor does it. In Whedon's series - Spike does go up in flames, the flame of his love, his very soul amplified a million times over, literally consumes him. He is consumed by his own love, which consumes all the evil in the room, leaving Buffy alone to race out of the falling debris, to live. He does it twice. First in Once More With Feeling - when he stops her from burning up and states - you have to live, so one of us is living. Life is hard, but better than this.

In some respects their dance is the bookend to her dance with Angel. When she kisses Angel she wants to die, when she goes to kiss Spike, she wants to die, then suddenly live.

Both are bad romances, both end badly, but for different reasons. In one Angel - leaves because he knows if he stays, she will be consumed by flames, killed by his hand. In the other - Spike goes up in flames, is consumed, and in some respects killed by her hand.

The Spike/Buffy romance ends much the same way as Lady Gaga's video does...with the guy up in smoke and the girl riding off into the sunset, finally free. Many fanfics regardless of the pairing, be it Spike and Buffy or Buffy and Angel, try to imagine a different ending - where Romeo and Juliet or Tristan and Isolode live happily ever after, even if one of the two is dead, well mostly dead, and has a craving for human blood, yet it is still a bad romance a la the song below. Filled with longing, yearning, and pain. We want the fantasy, so well depicted in Lady Gaga's video below - yet in her vid, as in reality, the fantasy ends in flames.


End file.
